Wicked Big Storm Coming! Park Ya Cah!

The links in the post below may be affiliate links. Read the full disclosureBy Mavis Butterfield on January 28, 2015 · 15 Comments

This is a guest post written by my buddy Heather from Massachusetts. Since getting 2′ of snow is totally unheard of up here in the Seattle area, I asked if she wouldn’t mind sharing her “snow day” with us.

Someone at the MA Department of Transportation has a sense of humor! Either that or they just moved to MA and think the accents are hilarious. 🙂

Monday night the HH and I went grocery shopping. Make no mistake, the store was PACKED – in fact we got one of the last two shopping carts. But it wasn’t crazy, it was calm. New Englanders are not a bunch of newbs when it comes to tons-of-snow. We’ve got this.

Yes, blizzard’s can be dangerous. But if you prepare properly, play smart with Mother Nature, and have a back-up plan… well then, it’s basically an adult snow day. 🙂 🙂 🙂

I ignored email, baked and crockpotted, shoveled the coop, walked the dogs, helped the hubbahubba shovel (fine, only a little, but I’m still counting it), played with the girl in the snow, and got my week’s worth of exercise climbing a (HUGE) hill for sledding!

We got around 2’ of snow, but the strange thing was – it’s really no big deal. We shopped early, prepped, and enjoyed. Plus, this is New England, not Texas, so the state is beyond prepared

My garden is in there somewhere…

Notice the snow-blowed paths? The HH makes a path for the greyhounds around the house, a path to the coop, and a path to the shed. Plus he amused the girl with a little snow shower. A quality snow-blower is worth its weight in gold! This storm only ate one sheer-pin, probably because the snow was so fluffy.

And then there’s the roof – yep, ya godda rake the roof. If you don’t you’ll risk too much weight on the roof, dangerous snow overhangs, and worst-of-all, ICE DAMS.

When I took the dogs for a walk today, I saw this mailbox fail. 😉 I scooped it out and shut the door, luckily there wasn’t any mail in there.

This is what the early morning blizzard looks like with a hot chocolate in your hand. It started in the early hours of Tuesday and snowed continuously all day. Luckily it was super light and fluffy, for shoveling. But not good snowman material.

The coop was a bit difficult to shovel – cause really, where do you put it all? It was two feet in a confined place. I basically decided to shovel half of it and lay down some leaves so the little princesses can stop on the snow (commence eye rolls now).

My stash of leaves have come in handy again and again covering mud and snow. Plus they decompose, mix with chix poo, and turn into awesome garden box material.

See that water heater under the waterer? Worth.it’s.weight.in.gold. This is the one I have. I buried the extension cord back in the fall and happily it’s working like a charm. As soon as I knocked off the snow that had built up over it, and scooped out the thin ring of ice, the water flowed again. I couldn’t believe it!

The best part about an adult snow day with no work and no email?

I get to do whatever I want! And today, I had my eye on the bucket of potting soil I made up in the fall for seed starting. There was a blizzard outside but I still managed to get my fingers in the dirt! So I got to work making my winter sowing buckets. Last year was a HUGE success. My winter sowing buckets produced an entire lavender hedge, a ton of perennials including Echinacea, Lemon Balm, and Chamomile. This year I’ve got plans on growing Ginseng in my winter sowing buckets. I’ve never grown ginseng so we’ll see how it goes.

We also made monkey bread!!

I don’t have a bunt pan, and this is the only recipe I would use for a bunt pan – so I cheat and fashion a bunt pan with a deep glass bowl and a glass cup. I let it rise overnight a little and again in the morning before baking.

Hmmmm, it’s like love on a plate.

Do you have snow on the ground? How are you passing the time? And what is your favorite snow day food to make?

~Heather from Massachusetts

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Comments

Does Heather from Massachusetts remove the glass cup before baking her monkey bread? (I don’t know if the cup is heat proof, and it seems like the bread would fill in the space once the cup is removed)

We are in one of the towns that received a snow jackpot, so we are in a 3-way tie for the most snow at 3 feet. Drifts, of course, are higher. Hubby and I did some digging but we have this very kind son who arrived after 3 consecutive 12-hour shifts as a firefighter to do most of the work here. Somewhere along the way, we did something right…

Thanks for this guest post, Mavis, so the rest of the country can see what we are living through. I am in New Hampshire and this is the most snow that I have seen since the blizzard of ’78 back when I lived in Philadelphia. It took myself and 5 neighbors to dig out my car today. Let’s hear it for the neighbors, yeah!

That’s a pyrex bowl and a glass (cup). I left it in while baking. All went well. Remove the cup when done, put a plate over the bowl and flip it over. Then prepare for baking praise from everyone in the house 😉

I would like thank Heather for the great idea for the winter sowing buckets!!!! I am totally going to do that!! I don’t own a green house & with 6 of us in small home, no room for starting plants indoors. Our climate is such that it’s difficult to know when to begin planting outside (think freezing weather and/or snow in April), so this is an easy idea that I can do!! Yippee!! I am going to share this w/ my best gardening buddies! Thank you Heather & Mavis!! 🙂
Love the snow, too!! I miss having that much on the ground in the winter……how fun for the kids! And for adult snow days!

Here in Northeast CT we were right there with Heather. Who counts the inches after it gets past a foot? It’s just wicked deep!
Thank goodness there wasn’t wide spread power outages.
I have to agree with everyone: Neighbors are great in these situations. We all get out there together!

Having lived in the Seattle area most of my life, I have had the “luck” to experience many blizzards and power outages here. They are NOT fun! The first really bad one I remember was when I was in kindergarten and had the chickenpox. Went out and rolled in the snow….got in load of trouble. Record lows set that year are still the record lows. One year I remember getting stuck at school and had to be rescued by a friend’s Mother with snowshoes for all! Many more float around in my head. One I spent from 4pm to 11pm on the bus getting home from work. That had snow, wind and thunder.

Awwwww, thanks Heather for sharing!! I SOOOOO miss a wicked good snowstorm!! Born and raised in MA, miss it SOOOOO much! Kept a live feed from a local webcam going so I could live vicariously through my screen : ( MA relatives would rather have this Seattle weather, but I want a snow day!